Talk like a Pirate!

Do you follow calendar events in your early years setting? Did you know that on the 19th September it is ‘Talk like a pirate day’?Well, I didn’t until a couple of years ago.It hasn’t been around that long but I think some of the new events are quite fun as a starting point.Whether, in your setting, you plan most of the activities or it is child led, themed days can be a great stimulus.

For example with ‘Talk like a pirate day’, there are lots of ways you could incorporate this theme in a day or even a week.

Books:

Role play area:

Create a Ship or Treasure Island.

Outdoors:

Have a basket of resources so the children can create: trails, ships, hideouts …

Water and sand play with boats and small world people

Dig for treasure in the muddy area

Laminated images of wanted posters and treasure maps (the children create these)

Drawing, Painting, Writing:

The children create the treasure maps, wanted posters,

Designing and constructing:

Construction equipment and include some pictures of boats, pirates, mini islands…

Card, paper and other materials to make hats, eye patches, wooden legs…

Music:

Listening and moving to pirate themed music:

Songs:

What shall we do with the lazy pirate?

When I was 1

I’m pirate Jack.

This is a song that I wrote a few years ago.The children love bouncing and shaking the puppet as we sing the song, and looking underneath whilst they listen to what Jack can hear.If you would like a copy of this song then you can sign up for FREE to access it. If you would like to sign up for FREE please click on this link: https://musicalabc.simplero.com/page/69533

I’m sure you can think of many more ideas, these are just a few I thought about whilst writing this blog. I’d love to hear if you are doing anything for ‘Talk like a pirate day’ and afterwards which activities the children loved.

Anne is a qualified teacher, musician, composer and mum! In 2008 she setup Musical abc to offer a LIVE music experience for children under 5. She continues to offer classes for the under 5s and also offers training for Early Years practitioners.